Recently, we caught up with Jeff Posey, Founder and President of Hellfire Games to ask him how things went for Novus Prime's first year and its latest expansion, Vindication. YPSH : Hi Jeff! Good to see you back here at YourPlaystationHome! Congratulations on your first year with Novus Prime! It’s been a year now (December 2nd, 2010) since Hellfire Games brought us Novus Prime in PS Home. Let's start by looking back at how things went for Hellfire Games in this first year. What would you say was your proudest accomplishment since the introduction of Novus Prime? JP : Thanks for having me! I would say our proudest accomplishments are the multiplayer matchmaking features in Novus Prime and PlayStation Home Hold 'Em. It’s really easy to jump right into our multiplayer games. YPSH : As the year progressed, what responses did you get from the PS Home community? JP : We’ve got a really passionate community of players who love Novus Prime. Judging from the feedback we’ve seen over the past year, there’s a huge audience of players who appreciate deep, rewarding gameplay in PlayStation Home, and we’re happy to deliver an experience that keeps them coming back day after day to level up, hang out with their friends, and compete on the leaderboards. YPSH : Did these responses change your direction for Novus Prime in any way? JP : We’ve always had a pretty specific vision for the future of Novus Prime. The general design of the game hasn’t strayed much from what we planned from the start, but community feedback always lets us know if we’re on the right track with our expansion content. YPSH : The year also saw Novus Prime’s first expansion, “Escalation”. PS Home users always like to see developers re-visit their creations and expand on them. How was the feedback on that and will that feedback lead to future changes in Novus Prime? JP : Player feedback plays a big part in our decisions on what to include in new expansions. We recently polled our fans on Facebook to see what they wanted most in the next update, and “increased ranks and rewards” came out on top by a landslide. So, we increased the level cap to 30 and added a ton of new rewards with our latest expansion, and we’re eager to see what the fans think. YPSH : 2011 also saw Novus Prime’s 1 millionth player. Has the momentum slowed some since then? JP : Our player base has continued to grow since then, especially now that we’re publishing content globally in PlayStation Home. YPSH : 2011 also saw the introduction of the Officers Quarters personal space. How was the feedback on that and what did Hellfire learn from that experience? JP : The feedback was very positive. People love playing around in zero-gravity and playing private missions with their friends! We definitely plan to release more personal spaces in the future. YPSH : So congratulations on Hellfire’s First Anniversary! Let’s chat a bit about what’s going on now at Hellfire. Does Hellfire have any plans for development on other platforms? Particularly mobile? JP : Thank you! Currently, we do not have plans for development on any platform other than PS Home. YPSH : It looks like you guys have been hard at work on yet another expansion, Vindication. JP : That's right. It’s been in development for a while, and we think it’s our best expansion yet! YPSH : Very nice! So we can expect to see new missions, ships, weapons, etc.? JP : Indeed. New everything! We’ve raised the level cap to 30, added tons of new rewards, crafted new missions, weapons, ships, and more. We really think Novus Prime fans are going to love the new content. YPSH : Will Vindication add any different modes of game play? JP : One of our new missions features a “Survival Mode” in which player ships can only be destroyed so many times before the mission is a failure. YPSH : What about new outfits, companions or furniture items? JP : With Vindication, we’re releasing the coolest full body suit ever made for PlayStation Home: the Obsidian Pilot Suit. And it comes bundled with a playable fighter ship! We’ve also got some cool new furniture rewards and avatar items, including the Mental Conditioning Chamber, Personal Warp Disruptor, Nebulon Containment Trunk, and Workshop Table. Lots of new stuff to help you decorate your Officer’s Quarters. YPSH : Any new rewards with the introduction of Vindication? JP : Tons! You’ll now earn rewards at every other level in Novus Prime, culminating with the full Commander's Uniform at level 30, which comes in separate pieces for male and female avatars. YPSH : Will users see rewards any faster than before? JP : Yes. New players will now earn more rewards than they ever could before in Novus Prime, and veteran players will automatically receive new rewards when they log into Vindication for the first time. We’ve also added a Rewards option to the Main Menu which lists them all. YPSH : What about server capacity? Lag and freezing can be a big problem. Does Hellfire plan on any increase in server capacity? JP : While much of the lag and freezing is unrelated to our server capacity, we have recently revamped our servers for the launch of Vindication. The recent upgrade should provide a smoother overall experience than ever before. YPSH : What about personal spaces? Any plans for a new one? JP : There’s no personal space included with this expansion, but we’ve got something in the works! YPSH : It’s great to see a developer expand an existing space/game on PS Home! Looks like Novus Prime is going to keep expanding in all areas. Speaking of expanding, Hellfire Games started global publishing in October of 2011. Congratulations on that! How did that go, and I assume we will now see Hellfire’s releases simultaneously in all regions? JP : Our global publish was a success, and yes, the Vindication expansion is releasing simultaneously in all regions! YPSH : A while back, PS Home lost its poker game that many users loved. I don’t know how many people realize it, but Hellfire Games is the dev behind the new Hold' Em Poker in Sportswalk! I know that has pleased many to see its return. Tell us all about how that came about; the current feedback; and any ideas for future expansion (new rewards?). JP : Well, we at Hellfire are big fans of poker, and I myself have played quite a bit. Our expertise in multiplayer matchmaking and experience with poker games made us a great choice as the developer. Unfortunately, I can't announce anything about expansions to the Home Hold ‘Em game. YPSH : The YourPlaystationHome community was pleased that Hellfire started a forum here and is listening to their suggestions. We want to encourage all of our users to continue to use that forum to provide Hellfire with feedback on its projects. Thanks again for taking the time to talk with us today Jeff and once again, congrats on your first year! Hope you have many more successful ones with your projects in PS Home! JP : Thanks a lot! We have BIG plans for 2012. Stay tuned!
Cool. I really enjoyed playing through Novus Prime when it finally came to Hong Kong, and then upon creating accounts in other regions and playing through them. Space ship fighting is always cool in my book, and new rewards are also always cool. The only complaint I had was that there weren't pants for the outfit rewards given out earlier. It's interesting to see that this developer also did Hold 'em, is that coming to Asia any time soon?
i got to play a mission with (PSN name) NovusPrime , it was pretty cool to play a game with one of the developers.
Thank you Hellfire games for Novus Prime and it's expansions. It is a fun game that can be played with a small group of friends. I only have two complints. One no pants to match the shirt rewards and no pants and shirts to match the helmets. The second is no voice chat during game but that is understandable because the R2 button is used as a firing button during the game. Thanks for reading. I believe with Playstation Home anything is possible.
there are pants that match the reward tops that you can purchase that come bundled with a shield item for your ship for 2.99 usd. also the first 3 novus prime reward shirts match the helmets, just maybe not the ones for ship colours like the tiger one etc. also they sell boots to go with that pants that come bundled with a speed booster for your ship. so really they do have matching head item, torso item, pants item, and foot item. some you just have to buy.
I have so many Dylithiam Crystals I wish there was something big I could buy. Like a Special ship that unlocks at Level 29 or 30.
I wish Kozzmo would do the voiceovers doing Missions like he does in the first Mission...It's so damn hard to read the comm screen...
Or Beavis and Butthead could do a voice over for it, no no wait, it could be like Science Mystery Theatre 2000 and while your killing all the bots there is a small little character at the bottom laughing at you.
